Welcome To The Party?

Last week, Arizona Sen. John McCain spoke at the annual meeting of the Log Cabin Republicans, the nation's largest gay and lesbian Republican organization and a group that GOP presidential candidate George W. Bush has yet to address.

"I intend to meet with you whenever you feel it is helpful for both of us to do so," said McCain. "I want you in the Republican Party."

Log Cabin executive director Rich Tafel shared the stage with the former presidential contender and said the message was "reassuring" to members, many of whom still feel snubbed by the GOP.

Tafel rejected the notion that McCain was a surrogate for Bush in a calculated strategy of making the GOP seem more inclusive without putting their candidate in the hot seat.

"I don't think McCain can be used. Our relationship with the Bush campaign will depend on Bush himself," he said.

Tafel and other top officials from the group were not invited when Bush met privately with a group of 12 gay Republican supporters last month in Austin. In a New York Times interview, Log Cabin board chairman Robert Stears called the proposed meeting a "sham." But after the Texas governor emerged from the meeting declaring himself "a better person," the Log Cabin Republicans appeared to change their tune.

"I was impressed with his comments," said Tafel. "He didn't have to say that." But Tafel says the group changed it's position after Stears met privately that same week with Karl Rove, Bush's chief strategist.

The Bush campaign's political director, Maria Cino, also addressed the Log Cabin national meeting in Washington and discussions between Bush officials and the Log Cabin leadership continue.

Among the issues sure to be on the table: the prospect of an openly gay speaker at the Republican National Convention. While that would send a powerful message, said Tafel, he's more concerned with achieving ground on policy issues, such as keeping gay federal employees protected from job discrimination.

Winning an endorsement from the Log Cabin Republicans may not seem like much - the group has a membership of 11,000, and gay voters traditionally choose Democratic candidates by a three-to-one margin.

But research suggests the gay vote is morphing into a independent swing vote, capable of making a difference in a close election.

Gay voters represented about 5 percent of the national electorate in 1996, on par with Latinos. But the gay voting bloc is even higher in urban areas, according to Robert W. Bailey, a political scientist at Rutgers University who has tracked gay voting trends since 1984.

Bailey recently completed a report for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force Policy Institute which shows gay voters represent an estimated 9 percent of the vote in large cites (populations exceeding a hlf-million inhabitants) and 7 percent in mid-sized cities (50,000 to 500,000 inhabitants).

Bailey said as more gays and lesbians move into the mainstream, their political expectations become less radical.

"The fundamental issue is whether gay men and women perceive you to be comfortable around them. That's why the symbolic (gestures) are so important," he said.

And that's why Bush's decision to meet with a group of gay Republicans, without actually embracing their causes, could help him in his attempt to move back to the political center after spending the primary season courting social conservatives.

McCain was not shy about meeting with the Log Cabin Republicans while he was campaigning for the GOP presidential nomination. As a result, he scored better than Bush and ran even with Democrat Bill Bradley among gay voters in California's Super Tuesday primary in March, according to exit polling.

Bailey said that open-minded symbolic gestures also send a message of tolerance and inclusiveness to heterosexual, "middle-of-the-road voters who will see the candidate as someone who can deal with all groups in a society and not create conflict."

As Bush said after his Austin meeting, "It's important for the next president to listen to people's real-life stories."

Still, Bush is already taking political heat for reaching out to gays. Former GOP presidential candidate Gary Bauer told the Associated Press the Texas governor risked losing the support of conservatives to third-party candidate Pat Buchanan, and that a gay speaker at the summer convention would go over like "a lead balloon." Several powerful conservative groups, including the Southern Baptist Convention, also expressed concern over the meeting.

Expect Democrats to call attention to Bush's continued refusal to back away from some key issues of gay rights activists, including adoptions by same-sex couples, extension of hate crime laws to include crimes against homosexuals, and his pledge to veto attempts to repeal the 119-year-old Texas sodomy law.

Democrat Al Gore shares Bush's opposition to gay and lesbian marriages, but the vice president supports domestic partnership rights. Gore's congressional voting record earned scores of 90 percent and 100 percent from the Human Rights Campaign, the nation's largest gay and lesbian political organization. The nonpartisan group endorsed Gore in February.

HRC political director Winnie Stachelberg said the jury is still out on the value of Bush's meeting with gay representatives. "The more meetings we can have with those in politics and public policy, the better. We have to be very real, though. On gay and lesbian issues, one can not compare George Bush and Al Gore."

Stachelberg feels that gay rights issues have acquired a human face as homosexuals gain more visibility in American communities. According to a Newsweek poll rleased in March, about two-thirds of Americans have contact with openly gay people. That exposure seems to have had an effect on attitudes. Those who think of homosexuality as a sin dropped below 50 percent in the poll, and 83 percent felt gays should have equal rights in employment and housing.

Tafel of the Log Cabin Republicans said he's been amazed to see gay issues migrate from the liberal left to the mainstream. "The coalition we're conceived as part of is the moderates…swing voters. That's a good place to be in a general election," said Tafel, because moderates decide elections.